Eartha Kitt: sex and the 81-year-old

Tom Horan reviews Eartha Kitt at the Pigalle Club, London W1

My seat at the Pigalle supper club was at the extreme right and touching the stage, so that the first I was aware of Eartha Kitt was when her red satin high heels appeared six inches in front of my nose.

I craned my head back to look up at her, to find that she was staring down at me though thick black mascara with an expression somewhere between nonchalant appraisal and vague disdain. She then removed her matching red velvet stole, dropped it on my head, and slunk off to greet the rest of the room.

Sex appeal and the 81-year-old woman: it's not a topic that is addressed every day. But it hovered over every minute of this staggering two-set performance from the singer and actress whom Orson Welles once called "the most exciting woman in the world".

That was in the Fifties, but my goodness even half a century later you could see where Orson was coming from.

I had expected the usual frail approximations of distant glory that make up a night with a famous name from the past. But Kitt has still got it - and what an "it" it is. Her rapport with the audience was instant: warm, wry and at times telepathic.

From the long comic pause to the lightning quip, her timing was faultless. She commanded the room yet conjured extraordinary intimacy.

As for her voice - holy moly. She began with I'm Still Here, typical of the self-deprecation in which she specialises, but delivered in tones that ranged from "daddy's little girl" cutesy to foghorn on the Hudson River.

Periodically she would arch her back so far that she was singing not outwards but upwards. And then she'd cackle like an old crone and slump against the piano.

She spoke and sang in French, German, Turkish and Japanese. For every droll one-liner about loving men for their money - I'm Just An Old fashioned Girl - there would be a moment of almost unbearable poignancy that spoke of loneliness, and love lost or never realised.

Her version of the Jacques Brel song Ne Me Quitte Pas was a masterpiece and drew an extended standing ovation.

This was a night that celebrated every aspect of life: its cruelties and delights, its hilarities and its infinite sadness.

Kitt never flagged for a second. What an inspiring woman. She plays here tonight and Sunday, and opens next week's Cheltenham Jazz Festival. I cannot urge you strongly enough to go and see her.